Description

n8n-nodes-collabin

This is an n8n community node package for Collabin, a multi-tenant leave management (HR) platform.

It lets you manage leave requests, users, teams and the workday calendar via the Collabin REST API, and react in real time to leave events via webhooks — directly from your n8n workflows.

n8n is a fair-code licensed workflow automation platform.

What’s included

| Item | Type | Description |
|—|—|—|
| Collabin | Action node | CRUD/read access to Users, Teams, Leave Types, Leaves and the Calendar via /v1. Also usable as a tool by AI Agent nodes. |
| Collabin Trigger | Trigger node | Starts a workflow when Collabin sends a webhook (leave.created, leave.status_changed), with built-in X-Collabin-Signature verification. |
| Collabin API | Credentials | Stores your API key and base URL, used by the Collabin node. |

Installation

Follow the n8n community nodes installation guide:

1. In n8n, go to Settings → Community Nodes → Install.
2. Enter n8n-nodes-collabin.
3. Confirm the installation.

Credentials (Collabin API)

The Collabin node authenticates with an API key, sent as the X-API-Key header on every request.

Getting an API key

1. In the Collabin dashboard, go to Settings → API Keys.
2. Create a new key with Read or Read & Write permission, depending on which operations you’ll use (see the Operations table below).
3. Copy the key (clb_...) immediately — it is shown only once and cannot be retrieved again.

> Plan requirement: the external REST API (/v1) is available on the Pro plan, or can be enabled individually for an account by a Superadmin. Calling the API on an ineligible plan returns 403 Forbidden.

Setting up the credential in n8n

| Field | Value |
|—|—|
| API Key | Your clb_... key |
| Base URL | https://api.collabin.eu (default — collabin.eu is the primary domain) |

Use the Test button to verify the credential — it calls GET /v1/leave-types.

Operations (Collabin node)

Every “Get Many” operation supports:

• Return All — automatically pages through the API (500 items per request) and returns every result.
• Limit — returns up to a fixed number of results (max 500, default 50).

| Resource | Operation | API call | Key permission | Notes |
|—|—|—|—|—|
| User | Get | GET /v1/users/:id | Read | |
| User | Get Many | GET /v1/users | Read | Optional filters: name, email |
| User | Get Leaves | GET /v1/users/:id/leaves | Read | Optional filter: status |
| Team | Get | GET /v1/teams/:id | Read | Includes leaders and members |
| Team | Get Many | GET /v1/teams | Read | |
| Leave Type | Get Many | GET /v1/leave-types | Read | Includes each type’s quota rules (period, default quota, blocking, deducting types) and minimum notice |
| Leave | Get | GET /v1/leaves/:id | Read | |
| Leave | Get Many | GET /v1/leaves | Read | Filters: User ID, Status, Start/End Date, Updated Since (for incremental sync) |
| Leave | Create | POST /v1/leaves | Write | Creates a request with status PENDING; only the calendar dates are used. Returns 422 QUOTA_EXCEEDED when a blocking leave quota would be exceeded. Notifies the approvers unless Send Notifications is off |
| Leave | Update Status | PUT /v1/leaves/:id/status | Write | Approve or reject a PENDING request; returns 409 if it isn’t pending. Notifies the employee unless Send Notifications is off |
| Calendar | Get | GET /v1/calendar | Read | Workday/holiday calendar for a date range (max 366 days) |

Operations marked Write require an API key with Read & Write permission, otherwise the API returns 403 Forbidden.

Send Notifications (Leave → Create and Update Status, on by default): Collabin notifies the people involved, as for a request made in Collabin. The approvers are told about a new request, and the employee about a decision. Each person gets an in-app notification and an e-mail only if they turned that kind of notification on in their profile. The e-mail names your API key as the one who decided. Turn it off, for example, when importing past leave, so nobody is flooded with messages.

Collabin Trigger node

The trigger node receives outbound webhooks from Collabin and starts the workflow.

Setup

1. Add the Collabin Trigger node to your workflow.
2. Open the node and copy its Webhook URL (use the “Test URL” while building the workflow, and the “Production URL” once the workflow is active).
3. In the Collabin dashboard, go to Settings → Webhooks and create a new webhook:
– URL: paste the n8n webhook URL from step 2.
– Events: subscribe to the events you care about (leave.created, leave.status_changed).
4. Collabin shows a signing secret once, when the webhook is created. Copy it into the node’s Signing Secret field.
5. In the node’s Events field, select which event types should start the workflow. This is a local filter — make sure it matches (or is a subset of) what the webhook in Collabin is subscribed to.

Signature verification

Every delivery includes:

| Header | Description |
|—|—|
| X-Collabin-Event | The event name, e.g. leave.created |
| X-Collabin-Signature | sha256= — HMAC-SHA256 of the raw request body, keyed with the webhook’s signing secret |
| X-Collabin-Delivery | A unique delivery ID |

The node recomputes this HMAC over the raw body and compares it (constant-time) to the X-Collabin-Signature header. Requests with a missing or invalid signature receive 401 Unauthorized and never trigger the workflow — this happens before any node parameters or downstream nodes run.

Payload shape

{
  "event": "leave.status_changed",
  "timestamp": "2026-04-07T12:34:56Z",
  "delivery_id": "5f1c1a9b8e2d4f0a91c3a7b6d2e1f4a0",
  "organization_id": 42,
  "data": {
    "id": 100,
    "user_id": 1,
    "leavetypeid": 1,
    "start_date": "2026-04-07T00:00:00Z",
    "end_date": "2026-04-11T00:00:00Z",
    "status": "APPROVED"
  }
}

data mirrors the corresponding object from the /v1 API (e.g. the same shape as GET /v1/leaves/:id).

Currently supported events

| Event | Fired when |
|—|—|
| leave.created | A new leave request is created (status PENDING) |
| leave.status_changed | A leave request is approved or rejected |

Example workflows

• Notify on new leave requests — Collabin Trigger (leave.created) → Slack/Microsoft Teams/Email node, notifying the approver.
• Approve/reject from an external tool — any trigger → Collabin node (Leave → Update Status) to approve or reject a PENDING request from a ticketing system, chatbot, or internal tool.
• Incremental payroll/HRIS sync — Schedule Trigger → Collabin node (Leave → Get Many, Updated Since = last run time, Return All) → push changes to an external payroll system.
• AI agent tool — add the Collabin node as a tool on an AI Agent node so it can look up users, teams, leave types and leave requests when answering questions, or record a leave request.

Compatibility

• Node.js >= 20.15
• Collabin API version: v1.4 (notifications for leave created or decided through the API, with the notify switch); v1.3 and earlier keep working, but they send no notifications and ignore Send Notifications

Development

npm install
npm run build    # compile TypeScript and copy icons to dist/
npm run lint      # lint with the n8n community node rules
npm run dev       # tsc --watch

To try the node in a local n8n instance:

npm run build
npm link
cd ~/.n8n/custom   # or your N8NCUSTOMEXTENSIONS directory
npm link n8n-nodes-collabin

Then (re)start n8n — the node appears under “Collabin” in the nodes panel.

Resources

• n8n community nodes documentation
• Collabin

License

MIT